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GEO, W. RAINS, U.S. M. A, M. D., LL. D., 


EX-DEAN OF THE*MeEpIcAL DEPARTMENT OF THE UNIVERSITY OF Grorgeta. 


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READ AT THE OPENING OF THE SESSION OF THE MEDICAL COLLEGE At 
AUGUSTA, NOVEMBER 41n, 1889. 


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GEO. W. RAINS, U.S. M. A, M. D., ae 


Ex-DEAN OF THE MEDICAL DEPARTMENT OF THE UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA 


READ AT THE OPENING OF THE SESSION OF THE MEDICAL COLLEGE AT 
AUGUSTA, NOVEMBER 4ru, 1889 











é 


ESSAY ON MAN'S ORIGIN AND DESTINY 


GENTLEMEN— MEDICAL STUDENTS: 


In the rotation of the Faculty’s roster it becomes my 
duty at this time to make the opening address of the 
session to the Class assembled, welcoming you to the 
halls of this venerable College which is to become your 
Alma Mater, with the kindest feelings of the Instructors 
and their best wishes for your success and welfare. 

This is the fourth and last time that this service has 
devolved upon me; before another period shall return, in 
the order of nature, the speaker will have passed into 
another and higher sphere of action. 

Hence it is natural that the subject matter selected for 
this occasion should deal mainly with the all important 
problem of life and its persistence. As a further consid- 
eration; at the close of last year’s examination, the grad- 
uating class requested a discourse on the higher life of 
evolution. This accordingly was given at the time 
extemporaneously, and the present address embodies 
modified and extended what was then rather crudely said. 

As Medical Students you are especially concerned in all 
that appertains to the human structure; that mechanism 
which the physician is expected as an expert to repair 
when out of order. Of all machines this is the most 
complex and wonderful in the combinations and uses of 
the various parts. All the known principles of Physics 
and Chemistry are employed in its construction, and all 
the forces of nature appear to be brought into requisition 
in its operations. ‘he variety of its parts are endless, 
nevertheless combined and moulded into the smallest 
possible space with perfect symmetry and beauty of form. 
The minuteness of its ultimate vessels and fibres call for 


the highest powers of optical art to assist in bringing 
them into view, still leaving an extended field of action 
whose operations must forever remain invisible. 

It has slowly been elaborated through eons of time, 
beginning with mathematical points of force—passing 
through various gradations of matter and form with in- 
creasing complexity—until man was evolved as the final 
result and apparent culmination of the work. The strue- 
ture—so admirable in the perfection of its mechanism— 
is overlooked in the contemplation of the astonishing 
psychical phenomena, which pari passu has accompanied 
the material development. Attraction, contraction, sen- 
sation, perception, thought, memory, will, and reason, 
follow each other; and as man rises in knowledge, gleams 
of a higher existence flash into perception; then the 
earth becomes too small and life too transient to meet 
his expanded desires and aspirations. 

The science of medicine is the conservator of this 
efHorescence of development; to its doctor is entrusted 
the repairing and keeping in healthful condition this 
master production of nature. How extended should be 
his acquirements to meet the demand! He should be 
familiar not only with physical science in its yaried 
ramifications; the physical construction of the body and 
its surgical operations; the uses of its various parts; their 
normal and abnormal action; with a knowledge of drugs 
and other remedial agents with their proper application, 
but also, with the psychological forces that control the 
human organism, whose action at times overpowers chem- 
ical affinity and controls the medical agent employed. 

The Medical College assumes to instruct in the former, 
but has so far but little to do with the latter ; the term of 
instruction is too limited to include the complete problem 
of education desirable to the physician. In my address 
this morning | shall endeavor to partially lift the veil of 
man’s higher nature, and thus give a glimpse of his com- 
plete organization, leaving to the student at his leisure the 
exploration of the vast field thus opened to his view. 


5 

In my address to the Class of 1881 from this rostrum, I 
took for my subject the “Persistence of Life,” in which 
the constitution of atoms, erystals, and cells, formed the 
basis of my argument. I now propose to continue the 
subject by entering more fully into the investigation of 
the generation of matter and life, and to discuss their 
evolution. 

To do this within the limited time at my disposal, it has 
been judged expedient to treat the subject under separate 
heads, each distinct within itself, yet bearing on the 
general issue. 

Profound questions require mature consideration. No 
important truth, however clearly set forth, can be at once 
assimilated; the mind like the body requires time for 
digestion and absorption. To hear or read of important new 
ideas, unless afterwards thoroughly considered, imparts 
no real knowledge; but as Locke says, like fairy money 
vanishes into dust when we attempt to use it. 


The Origin of Patter. 


Throughout the interminable universe, through all 
space, through all substances, and between all atoms and 
molecules, there exists an excessively attenuated matter, 
forming a boundless ocean of ether composed of an infin- 
ity of particles, or more strictly of mathematical points of 
action. Prof. Huxley says “Astronomy demonstrates that 
what we call the peaceful heavens above us is but space 
filled by an infinitely subtile matter, whose particles are 
seething and surging, like the waves of an angry sea.” 

rom each of these particles there radiates an attractive 
force which tends to draw contiguous particles towards 
each other, the result being a globular mass, the revolution 
of which, generates centrifugal force or repulsion. This 
fundamental attractive power, called gravitation, is in 
each separate particle indefinitely small, but becomes 
infinitely great in the mass. 






The agglomeration of such particles into separate 
revolving ether nebulas—pr ly vortex rings—is sup- 
posed to form, or condense, into what are called atoms, of 
different dimensions, those of the greater size constituting 
the atoms of chemistry; collections or aggregations of 
which form the seventy recognized simple substances or 
elements of thatscience. The latest researches, however, 
seem to indicate that they in fact are compounds of more 
subtile elements, or elements formed of a still finer mat- 
ter; perhaps combinations of two primary elements,— 
perhaps but the one seen enveloping the sun im total 
eclipses and constituting mainly, in volume, its corona. 
It would be safe to assume finer gradations of matter to 
the ether itself, hence beyond the visible bounds and 
known laws of chemistry and physics. 





Discussion of a ital Ether. 


In the essay on the Persistence of Life the cell or vital 
force was discussed; it was there shown that it survived 
the destruction of the cell itself, being associated with a 
finer matter which interpenetrated completely every part 
of the mass of the cell, and which separated from it on 
the coagulation of the cell’s contents; the cell life in such 
case associated with its finer matter becomes an invisible 
cell germ floating in the air. Granting that such is the 
fact, then there must be distributed throughout the 
atmosphere such an inconceivable number of them that 
language has no words or terms to express it to the mind. 

The noted Scientist De la Rive ascribes the haze of the 
Alps in fine weather to floating organic germs. Professor 
Tyndall asserts that the biue of the sky is caused by a 
fine matter, probably organic germs, of such excessive 
tenuity that the whole of it, if compressed to a solid, 
could be held in the hollow of the hand. He says that 
the vastness in point of number may be inferred from the 
continuity of the light. 


7 


This blue of the sky must then be formed of what might 
be termed the finer-matter-forms of living germs. These 
life germs, or life-force germs, constantly arising from the 
disintegration of organic life in all its varied forms, from 
the simple cell-force of the spores of fungi to its highest 
manifestation, must form an all-pervading life-fluid made 
up of widely different intensities. As planets with their 
organisms have existed in the infinite past, then this vital 
or living ether must have also existed and been intimately 
commingled with the material ether of space. 

Papillon says ‘‘as there is a lifeless ether so there is an 
ether endowed with life.” 

Mr. Wallace, the eminent naturalist and co-originator 
with Darwin of organic evolution through variation of 
species by natural selection, calls this vital ether “the 
spiritual essence of nature, which superadded to the 
animal nature of man, enables us to understand much 
that is otherwise mysterious or unintelligible in regard 
to him.” 

Then in the formation of ordinary matter, varying 
amounts of the vital ether must have been enclosed, so 
that in the construction of a crystal a certain amount of 
vital energy being involved, accompanied by its finer 
matter, the crystal might be taken as in fact constituting 
a kind of low form of organic life. Its regular fo:m of 
ordinary matter, interpenetrated by an equivalent form of 
finer matter, and the whole acted upon and arranged by 
its interior vital ether or polarity. 

The incipient crystal is the first visivle representation 

‘of matter, and it may be also taken as the commence- 
ment or lowest representation of visible life. 

The advance that petrology has made in recent times 
by the aid of the microscope and chemical analysis, has 
been so remarkable that the President of the Geological 
Society of London, in his annual address, proposed to 
throw aside entirely the distinction between crystallized 
and living matter. 

- Professor Williams, of the Johns-Hopkins University 


8 


states “that not onl¢ do the component minerals assume 
a form as directly inherent in their nature as that of a 
plant, but if the surrounding conditions become unfavor- 
able, they change to other forms.” ‘And as far as can be 
judged by the phenomena presented by the organic and 
mineral worlds, they differ rather in degree than in kind. 
And to one familiar with the facts, there can be no con- 
fusion in speaking of the “embryology of a erystal.” 

“That the vital fluid circulates unceasingly through the 
arteries of the oceans and currents of the air, penetrat- 
ing the rocks, producing with the helps of heat and 
pressure like changes in the histology of the globe.” 

In the successive formation of atoms, molecules and 
crystals, there has resulted necessarily a progressive cou- 
densation of the vital ether, which thus supplied the 
pabulum for the lower germs of organic life. Thus 
arises organic cells, whose aggregations generate all the 
forms and structures of the vegetable and animal king- 
doms. In this progressive growth or evolution, the start 
is a germ of life of a certain order, which draws to itself 
the next inferior germs; these fusing together or uniting 
their vital forces are thus lifted to its own plane; thus 
supplying pabulum for the growth of the next higher 
germs; in each case a new form of life is generated. 

It has been seen that cell or vital force may be trans- 
formed into the physical forces of sound heat, light and 
the electric forces, but by no arrangement can these 
forces be reconverted into life. No mechanism can 
fabricate them into vital force; but it is conceivable that 
it might be gathered or condensed from organic matter or 
from the vital ether existing in the atmosphere, and 
probably the time will arrive when this will be accom- 
plished; then the health-restoring apple of the Arabian 
tale will have been discovered, and the fond dream of 
the Physician realized. 

The low form of this life-force, which appears to be 
condensed at the poles or extremities of crystals and 
magnets, was extensively investigated by the notéd 


9 


chemist Von Reichenbach in 1843-44, and classed as a 
separate force which he named Qd, or Odic. Its higher 
phase was examined by Professor Crookes the prominent 
English chemist who, recognizing a force new to Science, 
called it Psychic or Soul force. A comprehensive name 
embracing all its phases is desirable; I propose to give it 
the designation of Psychod, or Psychodic, being a union 
of the two names. 

This remarkable force was known in the earliest times 
by the Brahmans of India and Priests of Egypt and the 
Orient; the first giving it the name of Akasa. 

Its knowledge was carefully concealed from the mass, 
and its employment by the educated will constituted the 
basis of those occult arts practised in the mysteries of the 
old temples of India, Egypt, Assyria and Greece; as also 
by the secret societies of occultists called Astrologers, 
Magicians, Rosecrucians, and Alchemists. 

Its study has been revived in recent times under the 
names of mesmerism or hypnctism, also in the subjects of 
theosophy and spiritualism. Bulwer, who was a student 
of occultism, speaks of it as being employed by the edu- 
cated will of the “Coming Race” as the great power of 
the future, under the designation of Vril or Will force. 

The interest in the subject has been widely extended 
within the past forty years, it being no longer confined to 
secret societies or particular localities; it has engaged the 
earnest attention of some of the ablest chemists, physi- 
cians, physicists, astronomers, mathematicians, jurists 
and theologians of the time. It is by the aid of this 
semi-intelligent force mainly that the astounding pheno- 
mena of Spiritualism are accomplished, by Spirit intelli- 
gence either in or out of the body. By its action or 
vibration man is placed in sympathy with nature, and 
mind responds to mind without the use of language. Its 
germs are assimilated in respiration adding to the activi- 
ties of the organism, particularly to the psychological 
powers which perhaps have their origin or growth in the 
assimilation of its higher intensities. 


10 


Gravitation, 
[he Fundamental Energy of [Plaftre. 


Sound, heat, and light, we know to be the sensations of 
the mind or soul, caused by vibrations of ordinary matter 
in the first, and by undulations of the etherial medium 
in the last two ; their laws are extensively known and, to 
a certain extent, we are satisfied with our knowledge. 
When Electricity and Magnetism are touched the ground 
reels beneath our feet, and when Gravitation is reached 
we find ourselves floating in space. The most renowned 
mathematicians have successively attacked the problem 
of its nature, only to lose themselves in a cloud of meta- 
physical abstraction and to give up its solution in despair. 

Newton said of gravitation what Faraday did of elee- 
tricity, that he knew nothing as to its real nature. 

Sir William Herschell said “it is but reasonable to 
regard the force of gravitation as the direct or indirect 
result of a consciousness, or a will, existing somewhere.” 
Other physicists have made similar statements. 

All definitions of force or energy refer to the effects 
produced and not to the nature of force itself; this has 
been a mystery, and we come to its best conception when 
we speak of the will force of the soul. 

The physical forces are generally classed as gravitation, 
molecular forces, heat, light, electricity, and magnetism ; 
these are held to be correlative or mutually con- 
vertible. Such, however, is not the case with gravita- 
tion. Each and all the physical forces arise directly or 
indirectly from this fundamental energy; but it cannot be 
generated by any combination or inter-action of these 
forces. 

Laplace found its velocity of transmission exceeded 
that of light by more than eight million times, indeed 
was instantaneous in its action throughout the realms of 
infinite space. It is the one grand pervading energy of 
the universe, from which all matter and all force appear to 
proceed. From the tiny atom to the huge globe of the 


ll 


planet, which like a ponderous cannon ball rushes through 
space with a hundred times its velocity: to the blazing sun, 
a million times larger; to the vast starry systems boundless 
in extent—all are formed, moved, guided, and held in 
leading strings by this Almighty Power of Gravitation ! 

It can be only the direct and continued action of the 


Will Force of God. 





Evolution in its Gomprebensive Sense. 


The theory of evolution, the greatest generalization of 
the century, which has produced such great changes of 
thought in recent times, had its foundation laid at the end 
of the 17th century by the celebrated Descartes and Leib- 
nitz. It however made no prominent advance until 
Lamarck in the early part of the present century began 
the erection of the structure which brought the subject 
more conspicuously into notice. 

It was sustained or carried onward by Robert Chambers 
in his Vestiges of Creation, but it was principally through 
Darwin’s works, supported by Wallace, Spencer, Huxley, 
Fiske, LeConte and others, that it was more fully develop- 
ed, and accepted by scientists, and is now being geuerally 
adopted by the intelligent of the world. 

To those who may not clearly apprehend what is pop- 
ularly known as evolution, I will state that it had its origin 
in the fact that no two organisms are exactly alike. There 
is always some variation—apparently accidental—from the 
parent and from each other. This variation may be an 
increase of the acuteness of the senses, as sight, hearing, 
etc; or fleetness, strength, or other quality which imparts 
increased capabilities of obtaining its food, or escaping 
from its enemies. In sach case the animal will have a 
longer life than the other members of the family, and this 
is called the “survival of the fittest,” or “‘natural selection.” 


12 


Some of its descendants will inherit its advantages and 
improve still farther by variations of their own. In each 
case there has been a still farther departure from the 
original parent, until ultimately the changes will have 
become so decided as to constitute a new species. It will 
be understood that the advantageous variation in the 
animal will be brought more frequently into action, and 
thus will be strengthened by use and become more prom- 
ineni. Thus the ancestor of the horse was an animal the 
size of a fox, having three toes on the hindfoot and four 
perfect serviceable toes on the forefoot, with the vestiges 
ot a fifth toe or thumb. 

The middle toe or finger being most advanced or used, 
gradually became predominant, while the others, in 
successive generations, dwindled away; the bones of this 
finger with its claw or nail, thickened and strengthened, 
and the animal itself increased in size. Ultimately the 
horse was evolved, treading on a hoof which originally 
started asa claw of the middle finger of its ancestor. 


Evolution in its fullest extent starts with the all- 
pervading ether of space, the constitution of which has - 
already been considered. The atoms of matter resulting 
from the agglomeration of its particles, are supposed to 
unite into small masses, and these being drawn together 
by gravitation, by their collisions generate heat, and this 
heat increasing by the action continuing, vecomes sufli- 
ciently intense to vaporise the masses into a nebule of 
incandescent gas. 

This irregular gaseous mass, cooling by radiation, per- 
mits the constituent atoms to be drawn towards the 
common centre of gravity, thus generating a revolving 
motion resulting in a globular form. 

The continued cooling of the mass lessened its diam- 
eter, and correspondingly increased its rotary velocity ; a 


13 


period ultimately arrived when the centrifugal force of 
the equatorial parts, which had the greatest velocity, 
balanced the centripetal force of gravitation urging 
toward the centre. Then the main mass, still shrinking 
in volume from continued loss of heat, would part com- 
pany with its equator, which would be left as a nebulous 
ring encircling the receding nucleus. This incandescent 
ring becoming cooler, would ultimately break up into a 
number of fragments, which from a mathematical law, 
would be drawn together into a globular mass. 

Thus there would result two spherical bodies ; the 
larger ultimately condensing into a sun, and the smaller 
into a planet. 

This process continuing there would be a succession of 
rings condensing into planets, and these, forming rings of 
their own, would generate satellites or moons. 

Thus according to the nebular theory our solar system 
was formed, and in Jike manner all the distant suns or 
fixed stars were created, the aggregations of which are 
called stellar systems, each being composed of many mil- 
lions of shining orbs. 

Following the cosmogony of the earth after it had 
cooled to a hardened crust surface, and then passed over 
by astronomy to geology, it still continued an incan- 
descent globe interiorly, with its cool surface enveloped 
by a warm ocean. In this medium organic life first made 
itself visible to the naked eye, in the simple protoplasmic 
cell or jelly mass, endowed with properties in which are 
recognized the attributes of living matter. From the 
aggregations of organic cells have arisen all the forms and 
structures of the vegetable and animal kingdoms, as has 
been previously stated. 

Geology exhibits in its fossils the progressive forms of 
life, through a long series involving millions of years, 
before it culminates in the highest of the animal structures 
or that of man. This growth commencing with the simple 
life forms of the Archzn age, represented in the lower 
sedimentary strata, thence rising to the diminutive fish of 


14 


the upper silurian, ascended through the succeeding varied — 
geologic formations to the earth’s surface. Passing from 
the amphibians to the land reptiles and flying pterodactyls, 
thence to the birds and mammals; the highest genus of 
the last includes the family of catarrhine apes, to which 
zoologists assign man. This development has proceeded 
along one type of structure, involving a vertebral column 
with its head and ribs, spinal cord and brain, with two 
fore and two hind organs of locomotion. 

The fins of the fish gradually develop into the legs of 
the reptile, and these into the legs and wings of the birds, 
and thence into the four legs of the quadruped, to the four 
limbs of the quadrumana —the two forward ones being 
used as arms; the perfect type being unfolded in man. 

Iu this ascending series is seen the gradual evolution of 
the fin of the fish into the arm aud hand of man, with his 
five fingers, and two lower bones and one upper bone in 
the arm, supported and moving in another bone attached 
to the trunk; the leg and foot not differing essentially from 
the arm and hand. 

In all the forms below man can be traced, for these 
parts, the same number of principal bones, in the same 
positions, and for similar ends; but obscured at times by 
elongation, contraction, or union of some of the bones. If 
the representative skeletons of all classes of animals from 
the fully formed fish to man were arranged properly side 
by side, the evolution of the one type would be plainly 
seen. 


In the animal the contfolling energy may be called a 
soul, which arose gradually from the instincts, progressed 
to a rudimentary intelligence, and passed ultimately into * 
the development of intellectual and spiritual man. 

“When that momentous period arrived,” says Professor 
Fiske, “in animal evolution, when the physical variations 
became of less value than the mental or psychical, then all 
physical variations ceased.” 


15 


The cerebrum, or that portion of the brain employed as 
the organ of the mind, by constant exercise commenced 
to expand in a rapid ratio. The enlarged mind required 
the full action of the hands, and this necessitated by use — 
the full development of the arms and legs, and the 
animal became a biped with its head raised toward the 
heavens. 

The use of the hands rendered unnecessary that 
strong jaw which had been used to hold on to objects 
and for defense and assault, hence its bones and muscles 
receded by disuse, and the mouth retreated as the forehead 
was pushed forward by the increased cerebrum. The ape- 
like features gradually disappeared, as the mute ancestor 
of man built his fires, and broke off fragments of rock to 
use as knives, hatchets, and arrow heads. 

The mighty fabric of evolution which had passed from 
nebulz to sun, from sun to planet, from planet to crystal- 
line rocks and thence into organic life, ascending through 
the vegetable and animal kingdoms through a continued 
struggle for existence which had lasted eons of time, was 
at last putting forth the bud of its efflorescence. 

At what precise period the germ of the immortal spirit 
was implanted or budded in the half human ancestor of 
man, we have no means of knowing. . 

The change was wonderfully momentous, for then man 
was created, speech was evolved, and as the divine ray 
within him opened his perceptions, he looked forward to 
the future and desired continued life. 

The buried dead seemed gone forever, but their spirits 
returned to say that they had never truly died but were 
still living in a spirit world. 

Thenceforth the dead were buried with ceremonies and 
funeral feasts, and the implements they had used with food 
were placed in their graves ; at certain times sacrifices 
were offered, and supplications made for their good will 
and assistance. 

“From that period to the present the intellectual 
advance has been so great as to overshadow all previous 


16 


achievements of evolution,” says Fiske, “a new chapter in 
its history had opened with the advent of man. Hence- 
forth, along this supreme line of geueration, there was to 
be no further evolution of new species through physical 
variation, but through the accumulation of psychical varia- 
tions, one particular species was to be indefinitely per- 
fected and raised to a totally different plane from that on 
which all life had hitherto existed.” 


Man has continued to ascend from the rough and polish- 
ed stone ages, through those of bronze and iron, until he 
is now passing into the age of steel. This progress was 
very slow at first, but became more rapid as art and science 
gave new and better tools to work with, and moreenlarged 
perceptions of his relatious to the conditions under which 
he lived. 

The present century has far surpassed all the past in 
the number and value of its inventions and discoveries; 
a new leaf has been turned in the world’s history; man, no 
longer satisfied with picking up pebbles on the shore of 
the ocean of truth, has fairly embarked on the great 
expanse, and startling have been the results. Im the 
eloquent language of the Reverend Heber Newton, “the 
face of the universe has practically changed for man. To 
read the story of science for the last fifty years, is to read 
a tale stranger far than the wildest fairy tale which the 
fancy of man has ever written. Forces that would have 
dwarfed the genii of romance and made Aladdin’s Lamp 
a childish toy, are our familiars. The law of evolution 
stands over all life. Before this revolution the old intel- 
lectual systems are breaking away on every hand. A 
new universe, with a new man confronting it, forces upon 
us a new thought of God and of human destiny.” 


The supernatural is passing away as a deeper insight 
opens to the understanding that nature is but the expres- 


17 

sion of God’s thoughts, hence there can be nothing above 
her laws; everything that happens must be natural, how- 
ever surprising or incomprehensible it may seem to man’s 
limited mind and powers; such would be superhuman but 
not supernatural. ‘We live in anage of mystery. There 
is not a problem in the simplest and most exact depart- 
ments of science which does not speedily lead us to a 
transcendental problem that we can neither solve nor 
elude.” —( Fiske. ) 

The physicist confines himself to the known laws of 
nature in his examination of phenomena, and is doing 
valuable work in the fields of science; he is wise if he 
admits that there are possibilities in transcendental physics 
not measured by his metre, or weighed by his gram. 


In the ascending organic structure of evolution the 
roots of which were embedded in the debris of crystalline 
rocks, branches of different life-forms were from time to 
time thrown out, which in some instances after a certain 
ascent curved downwards, but the main stem steadily 
continued to rise upwards and ultimately put forth the 
efflorescence of man. 


Will it continue to grow, or has evolution ceased ? 





The grand mechanism of creation, with its countless 
operations extending through many millions of years, 
continually evolving higher and higher conditions and 
organisms to man, cannot cease its operations ; 2t pushes 
forward toa higher existence. But what higher life can 
there be? “Upon the Darwinian theory, it is impossible 
that any creature zoologically distinct from man and 
superior to him, should ever atany future time exist upon 
the earth.’"—(Fiske.) Here, apparently, the old problem 
presents itself of an irresistible impelling force encount- 
ering an immovable obstacle. 


fa'ge ty eet 
ne | P , 

4% awe ye 

> 


18 


Any new existence, following in the line of evolution, 
must have the organization of man —it cannot be other- 
wise. Perfected man can only be surpassed by having a 
body of such light matter that it can be moved by voli- 
tion, and endowed with such superior senses as to impart 
superior powers. Such a superior existence is conceivable, 
and would be strictly in the line of type evolution. It 
would have to grow up with living man, for at death 
evolution would cease. Then in a living human being 
there must be two co-existing complete bodies; an inner 
one of finer matter interpenetrating the exterior or grosser 
one, somewhat analogous to the gelatinous bone pervad- 
ing the mineral one; the two bones are of the same size 
and occupy practically the same space, and can be separ- 
ated by chemical art, but together form the one or actual 
bone of the structure. 

The separation of the two bodies in man is possible 
during life, and may be less or more, and this is represented 
by the amount of consciousness remaining with the grosser 
body. A slight separation is indicated by a state of leth- 
argy, and enfeebled physical perceptions and feslings; a 
greater degree is followed by a state of trance or profound 
sleep, in which sensation is lost, and but feeble action of 
the heart and lungs; a complete separation results in 
death. 

In proportion as consciousness leaves the outer body it 
increases in the lighter form as demonstrated by occult 
facts; and the powers of this Ego or Soul inerease in a 
greater ratio, since they are no longer largely neutralized 
by the gross matter to which it was attached—like the 
strengthening or releasing the action of a magnet by the 
removal of its armature. 

Under tavorable conditions it may be able to condense 
the light matter into a visible and tangible form, which is 
called the Double or Doppelganger, Scin Lecca, Wraith, 
Ghost or Spirit, and by the Brahmans Astral body; this 
fact has been vouched for by all peoples and in all times. 
It is only in a recent period, however, that the matter has 


19 


been critically examined by a large number of able men, 
in this country and in Europe, whose statements are 
sustained by unnumbered thousands of living witnesses. 
The accumulated literature on the subject—in several 
instances by men prominent in the world of science—is 
very large, and the earnest investigator bas abundant 
means at his command, as weil as actual and conclusive 
experimental observation. 

It is now known that the priests of Egypt and of the 
Orientals, had studied the matter from very early times, 
and had imparted their knowledge in several instances to 
the ancient philosophers as initiates. 

It is not intended at this time to enter further into the 
discussion of the subject, except by imparting information, 
derived from the above sources, in the line of continued 
evolution. 


After the process of death, which is in fact but the sep- 
aration of the two bodies, the soul of the animal, like that 
of man, continues to exist with its lighter body; but 
living only in the present with a dreamy memory of the 
past, it has no conception of a continued existence, hence 
no desires predicated thereon; thus its will power is not 
exercised like man’s, to prevent that gradual disintegration 
into life yerms—or dissolving into the vital ether—which 
has been shown in the essay on the Persistence of Life to 
be the law or tendency of all organic forms and forces. 
Its continued existence however, can be assured by the 
desire or will of man, as long as such will continues to act. 

It is customary to call the human being when separated 
from its grosser body a Spirit, but this leads to confusion 
of ideas, as will be seen in the analysis of man’s organiza- 
tion to be presently given; a less objectionable designation 
would be Evolved Human. 


+hy} 


Organization of J¥lan. 

Bopy. 

FoRM OF LIGHTER MATTER. 

Psycnop, a semi-intellectual force which unites the 
soul with the body. 

AnimaL Sout, with an interior yerm of @ superior 
existence called the Sririr. 

Pure Sprrir is the result of the complete develop- 

ment of the spirit-germ of the soul. 

In the earth-life these all exist together but in different 
proportions. In the lowest man there is present a mere 
germ of the Spirit, which indicates its existence by ex- 
hibiting a feeble conscience; the animal soul rules. In 
the best developed man the Spirit largely influences bg 
thoughts and actions. 

The soul has more or Jess intelligence, but the highest 
intelligence is derived from the Spirit, which in its com- 
plete development may be called Cexesriat. 

Cevestiat or Hicuestr Spirirs possessing unbounded éntel- 
ligence must perceive everything in its true relations; there 
can be necessarily no difference of idea in any case, hence 
they must have a unity of will and act as a unity, with 
inginite knowledge and infinite power. 


a 


The Evolved Human continues its development by the 
interior Spirit absorbing the higher faculties or forces of 
the soul; the lower or animal parts, from disuse, gradually 
disintegrate and dissolve into the vital ether. 

The development is complete when the last traces of 
the soul disappear, and the Pure Spirit emerges in the 
boundless realms of infinitude. 

If the human being’s organization was of such low 
degree that there was insufficient higher forces in the 
soul to supply pabulum for the growth or development of 
the interior Spirit, the latter is set free, and passes into 
the vital ether to enter into the existence of a new human 


- 


a1 


embryo. In such case the Evolved Human becomes a 
mere animal soul, and shares its fate of ultimate annihi- 
lation as an individuality. 

After death the Evolved Human leaving behind its 
grosser parts, is no longer subject to physical disabilities ; 
it carries with it its conscious individuality and finds 
itself in a new world, in some respects not unlike the one 
it left. Its far more delicate senses, which had been 
obseured in the body by the grosser ones, now place it in 
communication with its new world of finer matter; this 
it realizes as being more perfect and actual than that of 
its previous earth life. It is met by relatives and friends, 
some of whom may have long passed away, but who it now 
perceives had never ceased to live; thev welcome it to its 
new existence, after which it gravitates towards tiat 
society most in accordance with its sympathies and former 
pursuits. 

It finds this great difference between the new life and 
the old; in the latter, communities are heterogenously 
formed; the wise and ignorant, good and bad are associ- 
ated together by the necessity of circumstances. The 
worser are sustained and protected by the laws and 
customs of the better. In the new life its numerous com- 
munities are each homogeneous in itself ; the good are no 
longer hampered by the bad, and the bad congregate 
together. Like seeks like, and the material surroundings 
and capabilities of each association are in accordance 
with its desires. 

Thus the undeveloped in Spirit live in contentions, and 
more or less unhappiness; the worst avoid the good with 
whom they have no sympathy of feeling nor of pursuits. 
The animal-soul holds the feeble Spirit in bondage, and 
thus the soul is left to its own devices. 

Unlimited memory recalls every incident of misspent 
lives, and the tide of wordly influence having passed 
away, it is left stranded,—it may be for years or centuries, 
—on the barren shores of neglect, discontent, regret, and 
remorse. 


22 


The Spirit, in the more developed or good, leads the 
soul as a child into cheerful and sympathetic associations 
and surroundings: where congenial pursuits and higher 
aspirations lead upwards continually to superior states of 
happiness, knowledge, and power. 


In continuation of the philosophy of evolution a few 
more words will be added. 

Humanity is regarded as a Brotherhood of many grades, 
enveloped by physical and moral conditions over which it 
has but partial control, thus suggesting and urging 
universal charity. 

The evolutionist holds that this world is a grand and 
complex machine in process of construction, hence incom- 
plete and necessarily imperfect in its action ; it is becom- 
ing better and better as time advances, gradually evolving 
good out of apparent evil, and this has been its history 
from the beginning and will so continue. 

In the words of the able Cambridge Author, “The future 
is lighted for us with the radiant colors of hope. Strife 
and sorrow shall disappear. Peace and love shall reign 
supreme. The dream of poets, the lesson of priest and 
prophet, the inspiration of the great musician, is con- 
firmed in the light of modern knowledge.” 


The evolutionist worships in a temple that has the 
broad earth for its floor, and the blue dome of heaven for 
its canopy. Its music is the murmuring forest, the sound- 
ing shore, and the grand chorus of heavenly harmonies 
sung by the sweet voice of nature. Its preachers are 
“the tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, 
sermons in stones, teaching there is good in everything.” 


23 


The Being adored is the Mighty Spirit of the Universe 
whose divine presence fills the immensity of creation dis- 
pensing lifeand action throughout the realms of infinitude. 


In conclusion, I cannot do better than to quote the elo- 
quent words of Canon Kingsley’s Hypatia, somewhat mod- 
ified: ‘It is but a little time, a few days longer in this 
prison-house of our degradation, and each thing shall 
return to its own fountain; the blood-drop to the abysmal 
beart, and the water to the river, and the river to the 
shining sea; and the dewdrop which fell from heaven shall 
rise to heaven again, shaking off the dust-grains which 
weighed it down, thawed from the earth-frost which 
chained it here to herb and sward, upward and upward, 
ever through stars and suns, through angels, archangels - 
and seraphs, purer and purer through successive exist- 
ences, till it enters the great J Am and finds its home at. 


hast. 

















